The Conservative Party’s Group on National and International Security – ‘Uniting the Country: Interim Report on National Cohesion’ A response from the MCB 1 MCB Response to the Conservative Party’s Group on National and International Security Contents 1. Introduction........................................................................................ 3 2. Setting the record right...................................................................... 5 3. A comment on the Report’s stated aims .........................................13 4. Points of merit ...................................................................................14 5. Conclusion..........................................................................................16 ANNEX 1: The Muslim Council of Britain – an overview................... 18 Vision .................................................................................................... 18 Our track record................................................................................... 18 Annex 2: MCB affiliates as of June 2006.............................................. 22 Prepared by the MCB Public Affairs Committee with special thanks to Shenaz Yusuf and Dr Jamil Sherif 2 MCB Response to the Conservative Party’s Group on National and International Security 1. Introduction In January 2007 the Conservative Party’s international stability – the remit of the Group on National and International Security Report’s authors. published its Mid-term Policy Review Report on National Cohesion (hereafter referred to as In keeping with the ethos of the MCB, this ‘Report’). Entitled ‘Uniting the Country’, the response does not reject the Report stated aim of the Report was to look at outright. In an otherwise poorly researched national cohesion but specifically had its and poorly argued exposition, there are sights on Britain’s Muslim community. The extremely rare morsels of wisdom from Report attempts to examine the position of the which we can all learn. These include the Muslim community and seeks to assess its question of integration and the leadership. In passing, the Report takes aim empowering of women. But this Report at multiculturalism through the broken lens of significantly undermines the exploration of a security paradigm. In doing so, the Report these subjects. For this to be successfully criticises Muslim community organisations, championed, the Conservative Party would directing particular venom towards the need to commission a different report with Muslim Council of Britain. a newly assembled policy group. The MCB would be ever ready to engage in this This document is a necessarily robust endeavour. response to the accusations levelled at the MCB. It rejects the explicit and implicit This response comprises five sections: - assertions that the MCB is a reactionary, - Setting the record right on specific unrepresentative and anti-democratic assertions and allegations (Section organisation. The MCB’s values, ethos and 2) track record undermine the thesis of the - Observations on the Interim Report, as will be shown in the succeeding Report’s stated aims (Section 3) pages. - Points of merit (Section 4) - Conclusion (Section 5) Overall, the MCB views the Report as a tremendous missed opportunity. It neither Annexes provide factual information about addresses adequately community cohesion – some of the wide-ranging work the stated aim of the Report – nor does it carried out by the MCB. address the safety of the realm and 3 2. Setting the record right 2.1 Identity politics “The MCB uses identity politics to pursue a domestic and international policy agenda sympathetic to that of their ideological authorities. Thus, it argued that the Government should ‘change foreign policy’1 in a direction with which the terrorists would agree in order to deny them a cause, and very nearly succeeded in significantly curtailing free speech2 using the Racial and Religious Hatred Bill. It asserts that if concessions to its agenda of special treatment for Muslims are not made, more young Muslims will be driven into the arms of its more extreme ideological cousins.” (Uniting the Country, p. 30) The Report also commends those organisations ‘that do not subscribe to an ideological approach’3 and ‘eschew identity politics’. It offers the example of the founder of Pakistan, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, as a leader who did not ‘proscribe a particular political or legal system’ i.e., he was ‘non-ideological’. The MCB would like to disentangle various conflations. Firstly, ‘identity politics’ is primarily about identity, and only secondarily about politics or ideology. It is a reality that people today are comfortable with a variety of identities – reflecting their profession, ethnicity, place of birth, citizenship, faith etc. A Home Office study in 2001 asked respondents to rank their basis of self identity. For persons of white ethnicity, the top three rankings were Family, Work and Age/Life-stage; for those of Black ethnicity it was Family, Ethnicity/Culture and Religion; for Asian persons it was Family, Religion and Ethnicity/Culture4. The rankings a person chooses to describe himself or herself would depend on the context. A person can be a Muslim and a Yorkshireman, or a Muslim and a sociologist. However in the context of public engagement – influencing public sector resource allocation, political participation, moral and ethical debates, and educational practices – many in society believe that the most important identity is their religion. It is for this reason that the MCB campaigned for a religion question in the 2001 Census, which for the first time provided reliable data on the demographic and socio-economic profiles of religious communities. Why deny a community their right of a religio-cultural identity? Subsequent reports analysing problems of unemployment, health, housing etc have confirmed that public policy based 1 We respond to this particular accusation in section 2.4 of this document 2 We respond to this particular accusation in section 2.5 3 Uniting the Country, p. 29 4 ‘Religion in England & Wales: findings from the 2001 Home Office Citizenship Survey’, Report 274, March 2004; Table 3.2 4 MCB Response to the Conservative Party’s Group on National and International Security solely on ethnic classifications (Black, Asian etc) had been inadequate5. Issues of ill-health, unemployment and poor housing, among other social and economic problems, have been found to be more marked amongst Asian or Black Muslims than Asian or Black non-Muslims. The formal recognition of the existence of faith/religious communities in society, through official statistics like the Census, has allowed for a better informed debate on how to allocate public resources more effectively and equitably. Thus, recognition of identity signifiers, or ‘identity politics’ as the Report more crudely puts it, has allowed practical measures to be taken to address socio-economic inequalities. The MCB believes that public recognition of faith identity supports, rather than detracts, from community cohesion6. The MCB is alert to the importance of contributing to the good of the wider society and not just seeking community self- interest. This is an important challenge. But it can be met if the Muslim community is allowed to develop and acquire a sense of self-confidence – overcoming the fear of disappearance and a greater willingness to mix and befriend. The MCB’s leadership role has been to work towards supplanting the inward-looking approach with greater engagement as individuals in civil society. The MCB finds the references to Jinnah in the Interim Report bizarre. The Report enthusiastically endorses a man who successfully advocated a separate state for Muslims based on his ‘two nation’ theory through the use of what the Report describes elsewhere as ‘identity politics’. 2.2 Integration “The MCB does not have as one of its aims, the integration of members of Muslim communities into the wider society of the UK. The Group believes however that it should view its existing commitment ‘to foster better community relations and work for the good of society as a whole’ with integration as the end goal and should invest effort in achieving this objective. We believe that integration should also be the objective of other Muslim leaders and organisations which have the best interests of Muslims at heart.” (p. 26) ‘Integration’ may not be a stated aim of the MCB but its work in all areas would suggest that nothing short of full parity in the treatment of Muslims, and the appraisal of their lives in Britain on the basis on total equality, is what is sought. Integration involves not the supplanting of indigenous values with externally derived ones – with ‘full integration’ being equated with assimilation – but the acceptance of and provisions for those things which make integration possible and realisable; faith schools, freedom to wear headscarves, a responsible press and a public culture which doesn’t vilify Islam and Muslims. What the MCB advocates is the ‘naturalisation’ of Islam in Britain such that Muslim pupils 5 http://www.statistics.gov.uk/focuson/religion 6 MCB Briefing Paper: Our stand on Multiculturalism, Citizenship, Extremism, & Expectations from the Commission on Integration and Cohesion, 2007 <http://www.mcb.org.uk/downloads/MCB%20ReDoc%20Briefing%20Paper%20PRINTRUN.pdf> 5 MCB Response to the Conservative Party’s Group on National and International Security attending faith schools are not viewed as burgeoning fifth columnists any more